Pixel Projects

Based in Surrey, Pixel Projects Limited is the UK’s leading trade Audio Visual and Video Conferencing systems integration company that specialise in the design, installation and commissioning of ‘high end’ AV control systems in the commercial, educational and residential markets, both in the UK and overseas. Early in 2008 they made the decision that a powerful yet understandable CRM system would make everyone’s lives easier. In the short time that has passed they have already seen impressive results.

Company name: Pixel Projects
Company site: http://www.pixelprojects.co.uk/
Product: Sage ACT!
Date: 27/11/09
Region: Surrey
No Of Seats: 10

Situation:

Nigel Tallick was the Project Manager tasked with implementing a CRM solution for Pixel Projects. “We have quite a large number of clients that we service, as well as a large prospect list,” he explains. “And sometimes the projects we do can be running for over a year. We needed to be able to track all of the relevant correspondence and actions taken during the course of what can be a considerable period of time.”

Nigel’s team is comprised of sales people and project managers. The sales people are usually out prospecting for opportunities, with the project managers taking over when a project goes live.

What everyone needed, Nigel says, was a way of keeping all the associated elements of a project, such as emails both sent and received, grouped together. And he had good reason. “We are often involved in complex projects which can take well over a year to complete. During this time there are often lots of requests for changes, or variations to the original brief, so it is very important that we can record all communication, both verbal and written, with all parties involved in these complex projects. ACT! allows us to group all contacts involved in a specific project so we can easily retrieve historical information on a project by project basis”.

His experience led him to believe that a powerful, easy to use, CRM system would enable his project managers to quickly review the history of a project, efficiently sort out what had happened and reassure his clients.

But he already had a CRM system available - Microsoft CRM - which had come bundled in with existing Microsoft software. That wasn’t the answer, however, as he is quick to point out.

“We never really implemented it because it’s really difficult to implement something on your own straight out of the box. And we didn’t want some consultancy company to come in either, we wanted something simple and scalable and well supported by a reseller.” What he decided he wanted was ACT!.

Solution:

Nigel had used Sage ACT! before and knew his way around it. “I knew it was easily customisable by my users in the ways that I wanted, without the need for difficult coding.” “What I like about ACT! (and I’ve used a number of different systems so I know the competition) is the way that all the history is displayed in a chronological order on the front screen. You don’t have to keep jumping around between various dates, you just can scroll down through the activities chronologically which makes it easier and faster to use.”

But even so he wanted to re-evaluate ACT! to make sure it still fulfilled the company’s requirements. He quickly found he had chosen the right reseller. “DMC were very proactive and responsive to our needs,” he says. “They quickly sent us a demo copy and talked us through the latest version of ACT!.“

Impressed, Nigel bought the system. “DMC took just one day to set us up and one more day for training of users and administrators, which was all part of the agreed package.”

Also part of the package was a one year support pack. “I was glad of that,” he explains, “because now it’s all fine - but for the first three months I was on the phone to DMC all the time. Not with faults, I hasten to add, but because we forgot things. DMC were always helpful and patient in sorting us out. Their support guys have been very good.”

Benefits:

After seven months in action ACT! is doing everything Nigel wanted it do and more. “We’re a small company and ACT! allows us to produce clear reports and keep accurate track of what we are doing, “ he explains.

And there’s more. “It has made us more efficient in the way we report internally, which is good, and it will also make us more efficient in our customer response.”

As Nigel points out, ACT! software makes things better for business. “The key thing for us is that long term projects always remain on track with our outside suppliers all efficiently managed. It’s crucial that we have a repository of information to refer to and ACT! captures and manages it all.”